Enabling Human Space Exploration Missions Through Progressively Earth Independent Medical Operations (EIMO).

Current Space Medicine operations depend on terrestrial support to manage medical events. As astronauts travel to destinations such as the Moon, Mars, and beyond, distance will substantially limit this support and require increasing medical autonomy from the crew. This paper defines Earth Independent Medical Operations (EIMO) and identifies key elements of a conceptual EIMO system.

Bridging the gap between military prolonged field care monitoring and exploration spaceflight: the compensatory reserve.

The concept of prolonged field care (PFC), or medical care applied beyond doctrinal planning timelines, is the top priority capability gap across the US Army. PFC is the idea that combat medics must be prepared to provide medical care to serious casualties in the field without the support of robust medical infrastructure or resources in the event of delayed medical evacuation. With limited resources, significant distances to travel before definitive care, and an inability to evacuate in a timely fashion, medical care during exploration spaceflight constitutes the ultimate example PFC.

Is obesity a predictor of mortality, morbidity and readmission after cardiac surgery?

Introduction: Obesity has been described as a risk factor for the development of coronary artery disease, but it has not been determined whether obesity is associated with adverse outcomes after cardiac surgery. Therefore, we analyzed a large cohort of patients who had undergone cardiac surgery to determine whether obesity is a predictor of mortality, morbidity or early readmission to hospital.

Methods: At the London Health Sciences Centre, an academic tertiary care centre, we prospectively entered data from the cardiac surgical database from July 1999 to April 2002.